#STORYTIME - The life of a 21 year old boy in VENEZUELA, a small summary that you should know about me
I am a young boy, I am 21 years old and I was born in the city of Caracas, Venezuela. I come from a very big family with foreign roots, because my paternal grandparents are from Colombia, exactly from the city of Barranquilla and surroundings, my maternal grandparents do not remember them very well, because the last time I saw them I was maybe 10 years old but they were from the city of Puerto la Cruz, Anzoategui, Venezuela. My family is characterized by being very festive and cheerful and supports others whenever possible. I basically grew up with my paternal grandparents and my cousins who are almost the same age.
However, my life has taken immense turns over the past few years. Since I was small I always saw my parents arguing for an endless number of things, my father was always very jealous like my mother and because of that they always argued, however, sometimes they were happy when my brothers and I were close or that they tried. I remember that many times things were thrown and hurt, until they separated, I was between 6 and 7 years old, really a baby, but it was in the hands of my dad and my grandparents and I lost contact with my mom. My father started dating another woman, it should be noted that she was my second cousin and first cousin to him, she always treated us well at that time, they got married and decided to start their life together, so they proposed ideas to generate income for the family, so my father thought about opening a beauty salon for women, they got a picturesque place in a quite busy place in the city of Caracas and after a year they had enough fixed clients and they were known in that area, but my dad I always thought about going further. He, realized that women pay anything to be well presented and glamorous, that is, they made manicures, pedicures, hair straightening, hair color changes, etc., and that's where the real market was , so he decided to invest in a new Brazilian product known industrially as Keratin, this is known as a treatment for hair straightening but according to various researches reveal that keratin is recommended to give strength, control and silkiness to the hair, due to its chemical composition that guarantees the restoration of hair by 85% and despite wet hair or paint or other this could last smoothed for several months. So he started importing this product and promoting it in his beauty salon.
Seeing that this product was very successful he decided to go further, he wanted to be the only distributor / importer of the said brand and product in Venezuela, so he started to do all the paperwork, which in Venezuela is a lot of time and money. He starts a registered anonymous company and gets a small office and starts working as a distributor and to promote the product in other hairdressers and beauty salons; In the beginning, he only started working with three people, he, my stepmother and my aunt, they worked every day from very early until night going from local to local, hairdressing in hairdressing and, as if that were not enough, they took care of themselves. make the presentation of the products, the packaging of the product, the sticking of the labels, the invoice and other things that arise in a growing company, even on holidays my brothers and I were going to help them, but little by little the company was growing and they were joining more family, that is, basically it was a new family business because my father always thought that if he was going to improve his financial situation he would do it together with his whole family and that was it, little by little the family was opting for a better income.
At that time I was between 10 and 11 years old and I could have many luxuries that other children my age did not have, such as a PSP (Playstation Portable), a Wii Nintendo, my first cell phone, etc., but only for being a good child , studious, respectful and help my dad whenever he asked me. At that time, I felt that my father was exploiting me because when I helped him we went to work very early and he did not rest, but he also did the same so he was really teaching me the value of money and that it does not fall from a tree . Also, whenever I wanted something, whether it was shoes, a toy or anything, he made me work with him and after a while he bought me what I asked for, but in the case of school materials they were always There, he bought them whenever I needed them since he thought studying was the best way to be a cultured, respectful person with a great future.
When I started high school my father had already managed to expand the product in a large part of Caracas, since most of my teachers knew that my father had distributed it and by that time he had already signed an agreement with a Brazilian company to be the only one in the import of that product in Venezuela, but not everything was so rosy, if it is true that it was growing and the income to the family was quite good, but my dad started to win enemies, at least he helped a cousin he came from Colombia in search of a job for a better life and offered him work as a sales agent for the company and he gradually learned how was the movement of the company and the distributors, etc., and he learned so much that to steal product and sell it on its own and in the end he created his own company and I look for another product similar to my dad's and started distributing it into direct competition and that started a long fight between the family.
On the other hand, my studies in high school were pretty good so to speak, I was already used to being or trying to be an exemplary son, because always towards my duties, I kept quiet and did everything they asked me, besides, I always got very good grades in all my classes and my classmates knew me as the consent of the teachers or a nerd, but those comments really did not matter to me, because everyone, at some point in their life, they make bullying; But my good grades forged a good future for me and helped me to set goals in life. At the time of my last year in school and the company began to distribute in other countries such as Colombia and Panama, and our economic situation improved dramatically since we had already moved twice, however, crime and insecurity in the country increased drastically and people neither in their own homes were safe.
I remember that one day I went to dentistry for a reverence of my orthodontics and when returning to the house there were several distressed people, really relatives, and it turns out that they had entered the apartment and stole a myriad of things, according to the service lady who worked in the house, which was gagged, listened as they talked about my dad and my stepmother, that is to say that they already knew them and that they were planning a kidnapping. When my father found out, he had no choice but to hire police officers like our back guards; We always had 4 bodyguards with us, who looked for us, took us to school, even slept in the house, basically they were already part of our lives. However, for my dad it was not enough and we moved in less than a month to a better area with greater security and everything went well, but my brothers and I were in the difficult stage for a human being, THE PUBERTY, and in saying True, none of us considered our stepmother a mother even though we tried because she had always been strong in front of us, but she changed when my father was close, so she really had two personalities and we always ended up in fights.
At this stage of life in a person it is normal to start looking for their own way, for example my father had me at 20 years of age, and since we were little we heard his stories of how he and his friends traveled all over the country and made of yours together, and why can not we? My father always kept us on the sidelines and in a bubble, perhaps because of the fear that we would make the same mistakes or who knows, but something sure is that because of it I have stumbled a lot of times in the last two years. However, my father always spoiled us in his own way, but my stepmother was always in a fight with him because of our fault, so she said, because if we asked her for money to buy sweets she would get upset, if we asked permission to go out with our friends the cinema got upset, if we wanted to do something it bothered us and in the end my dad preferred to listen to her to avoid disturbances in the house, which affected us a lot because he preferred her to her own children.
So much so that I could not go to my own graduation party with my friends from school because she did not think it was and as expected, I did not go, it's something that is basic in teenagers and I could not have that, and other Things were depriving me because of her because my life was just studying and being in the house. Then, I decided to study chemical engineering because I was good at organic chemistry, first mistake, and because I had thought that with that career I could create impressive things like biological weapons, rare chemical compounds, etc., second mistake. And in the course of the race I realized that that was not what I thought and it is something that happens to most people because they do not really know what the university degree is like, but I still continued and it went very well in all the career, but to think that being good at organic chemistry at school is a good indication to study chemical engineering at university, because it is not true. Although I successfully passed my two university organic chemistry courses, I realized that it is really complicated, because it is a matter that shows us that everything can happen and that what you think is going to happen really is very difficult to happen and that it happens the least unexpected.
My teacher is a graduate of the University of Oxford, that is, she is more than qualified for this position and I really managed to learn with her and she motivated us to improve in each class, but it is a very different world and one learns to see chemistry in a way different because it is a matter of why it is this and not the other, and is based on an arduous analysis and extraordinary spatial vision, with saying that not all people are capable of taking this course, even many of my classmates decided to change their career university because of the difficulty of the subject, but I was persistent and managed to exceed my objectives.
But, to be successful in the university does not imply to be successful in the outside; being in my second year of career I did not know what it was like to go to a nightclub, to go out with a group of friends, etc., I really only saw them in college because my dad and my stepmother did not give me the freedom to be able to I went out and less at night with the excuse of INSECURITY IN VENEZUELA, which was partly true and they sought to protect me, but somehow I felt that they were depriving me of many things by sharing my experiences with my friends. Little by little, my father understood that I had to have more freedom, I had my first car with many conditions and I began to build a path little by little. At this point the company and the university were on track, but my home was not so much. The problems were getting bigger, my stepmother was bothered by anything and fought with everyone, even on weekends we woke up early to clean the house because it seemed to her, not as if we were ashen but almost , what made the relationship between us even more difficult, sometimes even annoyed because we did not study enough, by God IF MY LIFE IS BASED ON ONLY STUDYING AND NOW, while my dad thought he was studying too much, but every time he had some invitation for my friends to leave or something, they did not allow me because they said that being in the house is better, but if he kept talking about his antics as a young man and he always kept asking me why can not I do the same that he? or if I want to try ?, so I started doing what he did on numerous occasions in their stories, escape from home, I remember having reached a point where I demanded so much that I even had to start lying and say that I was going to university to study on the weekends what crazy, no? for just being able to go to eat with my friends anywhere, that is, I needed my space as every young person needs it, something that it was hard for him to understand, maybe he even saw me as a child, I do not know, but that's how it was.
But as if that were not enough, in addition to having to deal with puberty I had to deal with my homosexuality and do everything possible so that my dad would not notice it, IF I AM GAY, I discovered it basically at 14 and kept it a secret until My 20 years old, because I always had the fear of telling my dad, brothers, friends and family what they would say and how my stepmother would react, which always scared me when I had to talk to my dad about anything, so I started having another life in secret, just like Hannah Montana, you know? Then, I started to sneak out of the house to go out and try to be a normal guy, if I'm normal; Most of my friends consider me quite strange, some call me "Derulo" for the singer, not because I know how to sing since I actually sing HORRIBLE but because of my first name that is "Jeison", while others called me "Minion" for be short and because some thought that there could be so much evil in such a small body because I measure approximately 1.62 meters.
Also, I am a person who talks too much and fast, my friends have an expression for me when I speak a lot and it is "If they were to cover your mouth you would start talking by the elbows and the **** at the same time", but if it were not enough, they also think that it should be StandUp because whenever I speak I have good stories that cause a lot of laughter and I could be with them the person I really was, even though at first they did not know I was gay, but over time they make it clear and they do not care at all but some were thrilled. On the other hand, in my house I was always a quiet boy, who only studied in his room, and although if I like to cook for others, I only did it at dinner and some weekends; but I was never the person that was on the street, it was always reserved maybe because I did not feel so comfortable and because of the family atmosphere.
Still talking about my other life, okay, at age 19 I started dating guys without my dad noticing, some were studying in my university and others were not, but at the age of 20 things happened in my life that really marked. First, I started talking with a boy of my same age, he really did not give much importance and one day we started going out and out, so much so that we met every day and considered ourselves much more than friends, but he always looked for me in my house which did not bother me, but my dad noticed the presence of a red car almost daily for several weeks and always asked me "who is that red car?" and so my dad started to suspect, but one day when he got home from college he was upset because of my stepmother and started with the questions, or rather a mega interrogation, and in a desperate moment I told him the truth, that he was gay At first he was surprised, but his first words were "You're not a fagot, you're gay, fags are pela bola" and I mark my life that prayer, I think I'll never forget it; Finally, at that moment I felt liberated with myself because I did not have to lie more in that aspect and maybe start showing me how I really was, however, my dad started to change a bit with me and he always complained about whether he came out or not , maybe I did not want him to go out with this boy from the red car, but that did not stop him from seeing it more and more; I really felt very safe with him and I liked him very much, besides, he loved that he talked too much and how I saw life.
Being with him I was able to experience many things, it was my first love and I know I could never forget him, I named him "Gordito" since that was him and he seemed really tender and attentive, it was one of the things that I loved about him since first moment, however with time we started to have problems and I do not know, things were changing little by little, as we last leaving for almost 9 months; but what affected my life most happened in the month of March.
And this is when the most horrible day of my life arrived. My dad knocked on my door at 4 o'clock in the morning to tell me that he was going out on a business trip with his brother-in-law and a friend, and I imagined that he would go by plane, even though the trip was only 6 hours on the road. I remember it was Friday and I went to university until noon, I returned home and my father had called to say that he had arrived and that he was fine, the day was normal as usual and at the end of the afternoon my father called to say he was going back so that later at 11 he would arrive at the house. I remember going to sleep and at about 12 o'clock at night they woke me up to tell me that my dad had had an accident and they could not locate him, the back guards came to the house, they went out to look for him and as at 3 o'clock in the morning They called saying he was dead. At that time I could not think anything clear, so I sat in my bed for almost an hour without understanding anything, that is, I had basically lost my only close relative, and that I had no contact with my mother since I was 11 years old and now I no longer had my father, in my mind I felt like I was falling apart little by little and I began to imagine what my future would be like and I realized that my life was in the hands of my stepmother. Even though all my family was supporting us, it was very difficult for my brothers and for me, it was hard for us to understand the reality of things but here I do not finish everything. Anyone would think that having come out of the closet with my dad was the hardest thing for me, but it really was not because I felt mentally prepared for it, really the hardest thing that I had to do is choose between all my dad's clothes which is what they would put inside the urn; that really was my one to ten of pain, and it was my 10. I chose what I thought best, even select several sets and take them to the morgue. I buried my father and I said goodbye to him as he should, something I'm glad I could tell him about my homosexuality but it's not the same, I'm 21 years old and I have no idea about many things, because as I said, he He always kept me in a bubble and from then on things get much worse.
The days passed and the situation in my house became more difficult, my stepmother was more distant and it was something to wait for, we had lost a loved one, I tried to get away from the problems and I only arrived at the house in the afternoons since I preferred to be in college and lost contact with many of my friends for depression, but there came a day when my stepmother began to change drastically with me and my brothers. Well, she treated us badly and basically she got us out of the house because she considered that we did not deserve anything of my father's inheritance, which in the end we never talked about. And there began more problems, since the lawyers of both parties were involved, at the end of account we still find ourselves in those problems, she every time makes everything more difficult because she does not want us to have a part in the company or in any of the succession , because my dad never left a will because he thought it was bad luck but he really would have saved us many fights and we still do not know if they were worth it because she only thinks about keeping everything, which is very unfair, but she does not He understands it and I truly doubt that he will one day. Even, her lawyer taught how to talk to make us look bad because, as always, she spoke with us differently than with other people, but if she made life a mess and now more, why not us? We did not do it in a way of revenge, I just wanted to be sure of what we were entitled to, what my father had fought so much since I was very small, it is just and what the law indicates.
My father always said that when he died we were going to have the future of our families safe, what he would have never imagined is that my stepmother, my cousin, did not deprive them in such a way, because he took our cars away, house and we had to move with our grandparents, I throw our dogs out into the street, they even threatened us an infinity of times, I really had him or I am afraid many times. My grandparents have supported us in this, however, they do not want fights between the family but in the beginning it was she who started everything and who is separating her. Something that made this more difficult was the situation of the country, many protests, aggressions, inflation and the situation in the streets, made it almost impossible to deal with the succession of my father's inheritance and with my stepmother, my last year of career, And as if that were not enough, I stopped going out with the boy in the red car, because maybe he felt overwhelmed by all the things that were happening at that moment, I really do not know. But despite the problems I managed to finish my university career, I made new friendships, among other things in the hope of finding the gold basin at the end of the rainbow, which I still do not know if I have found it.
In summary, my life has taken several turns throughout my 21 years, I have been able to mature, and I have grown too much for all the hard experiences I have had in the last two years that I really would not like someone else to live them, Because being inside a bubble during my whole life and then having to accept how life really is and the badness that some people have, I think it is very difficult to face and I still do not know how I could overcome that and still Enjoy the little good things in my life. I know that fate took away a part of my family, but as it says "When a door is closed another opens", because I could count on my true friends during this last year, create new ties and I could see things that I did not I knew, I learned to bake, I started the gym, etc., I was almost adopted by the whole family of my best friend, almost that I am another, even her grandmother has called me by phone at times and it's good to know that I can have another family. I do not really regret having been born in my family and having my brothers or my dad, but with this new family that I introduce myself in life I have been able to learn many things, be who I am, share and have that pleasant environment of home. But I'm just 21 and I hope that I still have more and who knows what awaits me for a future, I'm already a chemical engineer and I have many chances in life to succeed in my own way, it's time to create my own adventures AND LIVE MY LIFE IN MY WAY, as I say "It's my time to shine" and I hope to shine more than a star.
This is all friends, it's just a small part of my story !!! Until next time.